


We Did Not Return the Same

by Coleman



Category: Dragon's Dogma
Genre: F/M, Gen, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:21:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26207863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coleman/pseuds/Coleman
Summary: I sat there, watching the sun set.What a beast she was, leaving me like this. How cruel. How kind.
Relationships: Female Arisen/Male Pawn
Kudos: 12





	We Did Not Return the Same

**Author's Note:**

> Pawn POV, main story spoilers! I loved Dragon's Dogma and found this old piece in my laptop and thought it should be out there in the world <3

The Arisen could not sleep.

I’d been watching her toss on the rough canvas of the bed for nearly three hours. It was obvious that she was not getting any rest. Still, I had no place to wake her. If anybody was stubborn, it was her, and she would fight for sleep till dawn.

I sat on the bed across the tiny division in the inn. It was not unusual to see her so disturbed, and since daybreak was only a few hours away, I did not have to wait long until she would growl and sit up, irritated. I rubbed my eyes. I wondered what it felt like to be tired.

The Arisen turned to face me. 

Her brows were folded downward, and her mouth was stuck in a pout. It was almost comical to see such a childish expression on this untouchable warrior, who took down giants in a trice without fear. I blinked, feeling something warm bubble in my chest, I had the urge to smile. I hesitated. I was supposed to be arrogant. I should not smile. But then again the feeling was like a jerk uncontrolled, and I felt the beginnings of a strange feeling on my lips.

But she opened her eyes and I was too surprised to follow through.

The electric blue orbs were like diamonds against her skin. She groaned. Reached out and scratched her white hair. In movements practiced for countless times, she reached for her surcoat and began to dress.

She did not speak to me, she did not even notice that I had been staring at her as she lay in bed. As she rose from the canopy, muscle under dark skin rippling against the bindings of her underclothes—I heard her deep voice, smooth like oil, in a sleepy tone that was characteristic of the morning hour.

“Let’s be going, then.”

I stared longer at the back of her head from my perch. How she got up every morning to do her duties, to help people, to risk her life for strangers and coin, I would never comprehend. I sat a little more in awe as the Arisen pulled a mace from the bottom of the bed and sheathed it with ease. I shook my head slightly as I stood up.

Arrogant. I must remember.

“About time you got up, Arisen.”

She turned around to look at me with an expression I did not know. I was only familiar with the face of her sleep, of her pain, and of her victories. The color of her impossibly short hair caught the light of the lantern and almost blinded me. “As if you could get work done without me around.”

I felt something pull at the corners of my lips. 

“Oh,” I remembered the bounty. “I brought this back for you.”

I did not know I was smiling.

◊

Devilfire Grove.

Fire. The drake.

I slipped, hit my head, was bathed in flames. Darkness greeted me. A familiar silence that felt like the Rift.

Then arms. Pulling me. My vision returned. I could not hear save a muffled shouting and the flapping of the drake’s wings. I looked up to see the Arisen, her face was almost chiding me, scolding me. She dragged me to stand, and I blurt out an apology. There were seconds of a shared glance, something she did every time she aided us, making sure we could fight. Because she could. You could see it in her eyes. The battle made her blood race and put a wicked twist in her face.

The drake was turning to face us again, and quick as she came to my aid, she left me. Running off. She did not look back. I was abandoned.

It did not matter and I took no offense as I raised my longbow at the wyrm. I could fall again and again, but she would have to run and take care of her life— if not, who would aid us.

◊

The Arisen was silent. 

Constantly on the watch, ever-cautious, even if she did not need to be so. The beasts she had slain had left her scars, but she had grown evermore strong because of them. She was no longer a mere fishmonger from Cassardis. She was far from that.

She was also cruel.

Fierce to a fault. Bloodlust and hunger almost palpable and fearful in her veins. A monster to those who fought her and with her. She did not spare any life. She saw no reason as to why. Her strength had made her callous, and she felt no more empathy nor sympathy to the weak. She was a different person from the peaceful soul I met at the Encampment, just starting to break its shell, just seeing the true colors of the world.

I did not question her.

But I could see it in her eyes, those blue, blue eyes that she wished it could’ve been different. She wished she didn’t have to be so cruel. That fate had somehow given her a curse that she belonged to the world and her choices and actions should keep in consideration the better of the many.

She wishes she could be selfish.

I am slightly confused.

her hair is striking against my eyes again

She turns to me.

She says nothing. I do.

“It’s your choice to make, Arisen.”

Her bright eyes remain expectant. Does she want me to stop her? I cannot do that for her. I cannot choose. Thankfully, she turns away, and I feel the crushing weight relieve itself from my own shoulders. ‘Twas but an inch of her full burden, and already I surrendered. 

She shook the weight of the mace in her hand. I see the familiar grimness in the line of her mouth. I feel the shift in the air as she moves towards the figure on the floor. Already the incessant prattling and whining of the man in Salvation robes has become ambience. 

She disappears into the dark with a strike, a cry of effort, and then silence.

When Mason returns in soft applause, I see that the Arisen’s eyes are duller, and I fear she made the wrong choice. But it is not my place to question.

◊

There are times when I see that the Arisen is weary. When she desires nothing more than to spend the afternoon in Gran Soren, near the inn, sitting by the fountain and occasionally throwing rocks at the walls (not that she hasn’t tried people, she’d had to procure many a skeleton key just to escape from that).

She would not wear her armor, but still keep her weapon, and the sun would be the right hot that the breeze would not be a haunting humid lick. I would stand by her side, and wait.

One of those days, she turned to me.

“Ah, I forgot about the Ambrosial meat.” She says lazily, deep voice almost a slur. Out of concern, I check her hands for any Cloudwine yet I find none. 

“It seems it’s gone foul, master.” I answer. She scoffs, a sound of derision and exasperation.

“What am I to these people? A peddler? I ought be slaying the wyrm, not hunting for delicacies.” She grumbled but she stood, perhaps to check the inn. I followed her footsteps.

“But master, you accepted the task. If you didn’t want to—“

“I know. It is just that some of these people are getting quite lazy that they entrust me to do their jobs. I feel like a merchant of all trades… hunting for meat… retrieving baubles… slaying the dragon…”

Her voice has gone distant, as she stepped behind Asalam to retrieve what it looked like a slab of rotting meat. I did not cross the threshold to disturb her. Instead, I watched from afar as she fished out spring water and proceeded to cure the slab.

It was a lazy day, I suppose. The Arisen would be doing these foolish errands, and even if she would complain like this, I knew that she saw great relief in such easy tasks. They were ample distraction for the looming inevitable duty. 

◊

I watched her

Fall.

I was lying on the ground, having fallen from the mountainside on the way to the Greatwall Encampment, by my own foolishness, I fell to the depths below.

My eyes were losing ability, and the night was not helping. Beside me the ruins of the broken lantern gave enough light that I could see the forestry around me. 

“What a gaffe…”

Above, nearly thirty stories in the air, I see the stark white of the Arisen’s hair, peering out from the darkness. The Cyclops was still flailing around, its cudgel on fire. She was paying it no mind.

What are you 

doing

master

She was looking back and forth, to me, and to the others who were battling the beast. I fear I knew what came next. Such a foolhardy person, she was.

She jumped.

I watched her fall.

Like a whistling, the sounds of her descent ended abruptly into the earth shattering crunch. Dust and fire. I coughed. I could hear her groaning next to me. What a fool. I could almost berate her had I the will.

She staggered up, she had been hurt, but she was alive. She pulled me from the darkness again, and I was instantly healed.

“Master!”

She sank to the ground, I could see the red haze in her eyes apart from the blood. She was wounded. What could she expect? Jumping from that height to save me. She sat still for a few minutes, and I stood beside her.

“I vow it will not happen again.” I said softly.

She looked up at me and she grinned. Ah, I recognized it. That was the face she used when victorious, when delighted, when pleased. Her eyes were bright again. Such a happy face.

She stood, sipping a brew from her bag, and I could see her wounds start to heal. She looked up at the battle still raging above us, and started to make her way back up the mountain.

I followed. 

◊

I saw the Arisen peer at the band of gold with incredulity. As if she was mulling over who to give it to. I was so startled when she turned to me.

“Here,” She said casually, as if passing me cheese. I gawked at the ring in her hand, and then up to her innocent face. The fog from the Witchwood emitted stray white sparkles, and it caught on the jewel.

I paused. “I think I cannot take that, master. It is for you to give to a human whom you hold dear above all. Not your pawn.”

Frowning upon that, she pocketed the ring. “Someone I hold dear above all…” She crossed her arms and rubbed her lips. Shifted her weight. She scratched at her white hair, I enjoyed watching that, it looked like sharp cotton being sifted.

“Ah…”

She seemed to have thought of someone.

“Do you have someone in mind, Arisen?”

She turned to me, her eyes brighter than the fog. “Let’s break him out of jail first.”

◊

Cassardis honored her returns with feasts. One time there was a festival.

The Arisen had returned from staying the Salvation skeletons and its root as well. The word of her deeds had reached her hometown, and the small fisher village grew prouder with each victory. Frankly, the Arisen never planned to return purposefully, it was always if an errand was nearby, or if she fancied a certain rarity sold there. So when she returned that night, she was more than surprised at the commotion in her honor.

She was wearing the clothes that she would bear when she fought the dragon. I remember the scarlet of her mantle and the blue of her surcoat clearly that night, illuminated in lamp-light. Her heavy shield strapped on her back, the mace on her hilt. She did not hide her eyes underneath a helm. The monsters had grown to fear the color.

“Arisen! You’re back!”

Child voices. Followed by adult ones. All happy, all cheering. There was a sound of food being cooked, and raucous activity in the streets. Cassardis had no hall nor square, so the festivities took part in front of the inn.

She looked at them, then slowly, remembered that what she was doing actually gave joy to some people, that it was not all duty, but she was a symbol of hope. It was something she oft forgot.

I followed her all night, watching as she was dragged from table to table, touted by neighbor to cousin, paraded in front of the whole town, fed enough pie to burst, and made drunk enough to be uncharacteristically happy.

I suppose that was her expression—happy. I rarely see it, but I recognize it.

There was a dance, and of course everyone wanted to dance with her. It was quite a sight, seeing that the Arisen was an oddly tall person, she easily towered over everyone in the village. Save for me.

The small old woman walked up to me, and snapped me out of my distant observation. “You there! What are you doing? Go help your master out for pity’s sake.”

I stared down at Iola, I knew her but I felt uneasy taking orders from someone else. But the setting wasn’t a battlefield, and her words weren’t commanding. I looked out at the Arisen, who was laughing but obviously not having a successful attempt at the frivolities due to the height of her partner.

I made no sound to Iola. Should I go? 

I shouldn’t move without the master’s will. I…

How about a signal?

I remember the times when she would wave frantically from afar, shouting for us to hurry, to come. Or to go. Or to help. A wave.

I caught her blue eyes from the crowd and she furrowed her eyebrows at me.

Was that a signal?

I did not know. I did not know why I suddenly took a step towards her either.

Had I but known it was the day I made a choice that I was slowly slipping into a skin that I had unwittingly inherited.

We were giants in a sea of fisher-folk. “This pawn… will help… you?” She’d been looking me expectantly, almost like a mother to a child awaiting a confession. I felt like I was drowning.

She laughed. It wasn’t the guffaw or the insolent scoff she let loose in the duke’s audience chambers, or the distracted harrumph she gave Asalam, or the lewd chuckle she gave Julien, it was happy. Sparkling. Like her hair and her eyes.

“Aye, why not?”

I did not know how to dance, and quickly the Arisen guffawed at my attempts and then handed me a flagon of Cloudwine. It would not affect me but I drank it to appease her. Late that evening, she would be found on the bench of one askew table, and I would pick her up and check her in the inn.

I watched her sleep.

She was smiling. 

◊

The dragon was defeated.

But her work wasn’t done. I saw no weariness in her eyes as she trudged home. She would leave Julien in her home at Cassardis where he would be safe, and she would return to the capital to see how to aid it.

Unfailing service.

Then branded a traitor.

Once again, no hurt in her eyes. No anguish. I wondered how she was still human, with her unflinching readiness to accept the world. To take its burdens. As if she was a pawn of the world and her vigil seemed to have no end.

She had no pity as she struck down guards who got in her way. At first she showed restraint, knocking them down, moving on. But when one of them dealt me a fatal blow, she skewered him before he could withdraw his strike. He fell to the ground with a clatter, and the rest of the soldiers hesitated to give chase.

No guilt in her eyes. No pity.

We regrouped in the Union Inn. She was out of breath, but looked calm. I had not been so adept at expressions to realize she was furious inside.

Mason stepped in the inn with a bang, in his arms he dragged a semi-conscious Maximillian. Ah. This man. I looked at the Arisen and saw the glint in her eyes that shone when she saw prey.

“Traitor… has everyone gone mad, ser?” Her voice was deep and rumbling, she sounded like a chimera, prowling but unmoving. She was sitting on a bench, her hands propped up on her mace, she looked like a king. “What balderdash did that fool of a duke have you believe now?”

The Captain looked offended, but more hurt than so. “Bear me no ill will Arisen, I was only following orders. You attacked His Grace! It seemed—“

“Spare me your prattle.” She spat. Mason shoved the young captain into the inn and shut the door. The building was silent, and the candles lit only the back of the Arisen’s head.

“I’ve slain the wyrm, risked my life for the duke. I’ve found out truths about him that make me see what kind of man he really is. But that doesn’t matter. He will be dead in the morning. A weak man cannot live long when his heart has returned to tell him his failures.”

“What are you talking about?”

The Arisen ignored him. “Tell me what happened here. Why has Gran Soren been ruined?”

Maximillian told her. Mason supplied. She was silent. She looked at Mason, then at me. She did not sigh as she stood up. “Very well, let us investigate and see why the Everfall has opened up the capital’s streets.”

“Master?”

I spoke up, she turned to me.

“You’ve done enough for this world. Why risk more?”

She looked perplexed. “Aye, I’ve done enough. I’ve done more than enough. But ‘twas I that slayed the dragon, and no doubt ‘twas I that caused this occurrence with the Everfall. And I alone can fix this. This is my duty.”

Maximillian looked cowed as she walked past him. “Tell that sovereign of yours that I did not have to watch my loved one burn for a throne.”

When she stood at the edge, she turned. Mason had followed us outside, as did a small crowd after seeing the Arisen stand over the gaping maw that sucked air.

“Be careful, friend. Seems like a journey one does not return from easily.” Mason’s voice carried past the wind and the Arisen turned to him. Her hair was blowing around playfully, and I was still entranced by that color.

“So be it. If I do not return, I will endeavor to stay that way. I will spit in death’s eye, so as to his ire, he will chase me till time ends.” She chuckled, then peered down into the depths. She paused. “Ah, Mason.”

“Yes?”

She withdrew a gleaming gold ring from her pack. I remembered it. It had fallen from the dragon’s claws.

“If I do not return, please bring this to Cassardis.”

Mason understood.

“Of course.”

She turned. I stood beside her.

We fell.

We did not return the same.

◊

The warm shore’s sand. The lapping of waves at my waist. The sun woke me up.

I was stunned. Immediately my heart raced. “Master!”

I called out, reached out, and my hands stopped me. The sight of them.

No.

The red of the mantle was strewn beside me on the ground. The blue of the surcoat glinted against the twilight day. I could see my face in the water, my eyes were lightning, and my hair was paper.

I sat there, watching the sun set.

What a beast she was, leaving me like this. How cruel. How kind.

Typical.


End file.
